The Field of the Invention
This invention relates to databases for storing information and executable applications and, more particularly, to novel systems and methods for providing individual control of information distribution and use by applications and databases operating over a network.
The Background Art
Much legacy equipment is decades old. Hardware may be mechanical, electrical, digital, or otherwise. A simple and cost-effective retrofit capability has heretofore been largely unavailable to implement automatic control, Internet enabled control, or the like for much of such legacy equipment. Moreover, even a device that is new may be completely mechanical and non-communicative. A method and apparatus are needed to implement such devices in systems where other devices are processor controlled over the Internet. A generalized, simple, reliable system and method of upgrading, automating, and networking such devices, by those unaffiliated with the original producer of such devices, is needed
Likewise, the Internet makes information available. Some say too much information is available without adequate means to search and sort it out. Likewise, as information is collected, the people who own or control that information desire to know more about how to use the information, as well as collecting more of it. Meanwhile, much of that information trammels on individual privacy.
On the other hand, it would be an advance in the art to provide a system and method for collecting, integrating, and using information about a person, the physical world, the person's habits and wishes as well as location, activities, and the like, and relate that to marketing presentations. However, a secure system and method for serving and using such information, stripped of personal identification information, is needed, while yet permitting use of specific information identified with the individual but only known to the holder as an anonymous actor.